


Tomorrow

by contextomy



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-09
Updated: 2013-03-08
Packaged: 2017-12-04 17:22:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/713168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/contextomy/pseuds/contextomy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock is trapped in his worst nightmare - having to relive the day he returns to John.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tomorrow

January 29. Today was January 29. Tomorrow would be January 30. Tomorrow. He would be back tomorrow. It had been more than three years since he had leapt off the roof. Three years since he had stolen a glance of John Watson weeping by his gravestone. Three years since he had remembered what it meant to suffer heartache. But tomorrow was a new day. Tomorrow was the day he would no longer be Altamont or James. He wouldn't have to suffer the dryness of his colored contacts. He wouldn't have to fear Sebastian Moran at every turn as he brought down James Moriarty's network. Tomorrow, he would return as Sherlock Holmes.

  
He looked out the window of the train that would take him home from Sussex. Wearing his blue scarf, his hair shorter but dyed black, Sherlock scanned the countryside that passed. In his car, there was a investment banker with a mistress in the city and a wife in the country (immediately took off the ring the moment the train moved away, new DuPont pen, Blackberry with coffee bean price app, anxious tic), a barber with a cat (rough hands, muscular proximal back half of hand for handling scissors, faint smell of aftershave and shaving foam, wedding ring, mid-40's) , and the barber's two sons (seven and nine, mother died at birth, lockets containing mother's picture, father did not re-marry).

  
Sherlock smiled at the blond nine year-old when he stared at him from the seat in front him. He immediately looked away, suddenly shy, and turned to his younger brother. His eyes reminded Sherlock of John's. The dark blue cerulean that he missed. His voice. Sherlock had nearly forgotten it. After three years, he had only the imprinted memory of John's outburst now.  
"She's dying, you machine!" John bit out as if the words were forcefully pulled and distilled from his rage. Sherlock didn't know how to respond to it.

  
He turned back to the window, trying to ignore the glaring emptiness of the seat next to him.

  
When the train entered a tunnel, they were plunged in darkness and fluorescent light. He felt a distant memory of being afraid of moments like this when he was younger. The younger brother shut his eyes and covered his ears whilst the nine year-old held him close, smiling and encouraging him to look.

* * *

  
It was the morning of the 30th by the time he arrived at Paddington Station. The two boys and their father had left in the opposite direction. In the flurry of people, Sherlock caught the nine year-old waving at him and smiled almost knowingly, mouthing something Sherlock could not catch. His brunette younger brother remained resolutely quiet and held onto his older brother's jumper.

  
Mycroft had ensured that John would still be in the flat. His heart fluttered at the thought of being reunited with him - his friend, his best friend, the best man he had ever known.  
He felt his face pull into a smile as he climbed into a cab and directed it to Baker Street. The words seem to tumble so naturally from his lips - like a well-rehearsed script that he knew by heart. Baker Street. His home. Where John resided.

  
London looked more or less the same - new stores here and there, nothing worth mentioning. It passed by as quickly like a rhythmic blur, a rhythm Sherlock knew as well as the back of his hand. Bright lights, dull people.

  
Closing his eyes, he reconstructed the flat in his mind, the pieces and pixels building up, floating up in bright layers of smoke and dust. John was the one formed first. He was sitting in his plush fabric chair, tapping away at his blog, his toes dancing on the rug. Then Sherlock's own chair. The grey leather shining against the fire in the fireplace. The mantel held the skull, where John would hide his cigarettes and Sherlock would pretend he didn't know where it was. His moth and bat collection. Letters from Mummy and Mycroft. Cluedo. That damned game. John was always so good at it.

  
When the cab pulled a stop, he opened his eyes and inhaled sharply, not realizing he had been drawn into a reverie. 221B. The familiar dark colored door with the letters emblazoned in a permanent tattoo. He paid the cabbie and pushed out the vehicle, inhaling the crisp air.

John had been cleaning the letters. He even replaced the doorbell label. Nobody does that, he remembered saying.

  
Smiling warmly at John's defiance and the little things he did to remember him, he fished out his keys and quietly unlocked the door, climbing up the stairs. The creak on the seventh step was gone.

The door was slightly ajar, and he could see John's feet toeing the rug from where he sat on the couch.

There was the sound of sobbing.

"…Was nothing left. I'll see you soon."

A bang.

The toes went limp and no longer moved.

Pulled into a vortex of sudden stillness, like a droplet suspended in eternal vacuum, Sherlock paled and stood stock still before his legs finally gained the consciousness to move, fumbling beneath the detective as he made his way up the rest of the stairs.

"JOHN!" he screamed, barreling through the door, his body crashing to the floor when his legs gave way; his body sapped of whatever energy it ever held.

Blood. Brain matter. Parts of John's cerebellum slid down unceremoniously from the wall. A gun. Left hand. Suicide. Blood. Blogger. Heart. Blood. Sherlock swallowed, crawling up the couch. His hands shook as he made his way to a kneel.

He couldn't look at John's face. Seeing it meant it was real. He cradled his hand in his larger ones, pulling away the cold metal pistol (L9A1, Sherlock's pistol), and, closing his eyes, burrowed his face into his palm.

"John," he croaked, his voice dry and weak.

It was over. He was late. John was gone. John was gone.

He didn't know how long he stayed crouched over John's hand, but when he finally pulled away, Sherlock looked up. John's lifeless gaze. His once bright blue eyes now dull. His once constant smile now smattered with blood and in a fixed lifeless pull. His once blogger now dead.

Sherlock couldn't cry. Too shocked to process anything beyond what he saw. The implication of the blood, the brain bits on the wall, the ever-gazing blue eyes. They were just facts. It would never hit him what it meant to have John gone. What it meant to live without him. He wouldn't know the pain of having to attend his funeral, for when he closed his eyes and leaned up to press his lips against John's, Sherlock felt a painful lurch in his chest, like a hook pulling him forward into the blond's body.

* * *

  
"John!" Sherlock screamed, his body propelled forward in his seat as he jerked out of his sleep. The nine year-old boy who had been staring at him screamed and fell back into his seat, hiding in the lap of his younger brother.

He was on the train, heading to London from Sussex.

He looked down at his phone.

January 29.


End file.
